November 1: The Beginning
So, I’m lowkey doing NaNoWriMo this year, but I’m not writing a book and may not write any fiction at all, to be honest. As anyone who follows my work at SF Bluestocking probably knows, I’ve been struggling for months with depression and the lack of productivity that tends to come along with that. The last few weeks have seen some improvement, and I’ve been keeping up with regular, time-sensitive-ish work like television reviews, but I’ve fallen far behind on book reviews and having managed to get out a Gormenghast post in months. I feel better every week, but in spite of my repeated optimism about returning to a level of productivity closer to where I’d like to be, I’ve been stuck and not making much progress at all.
So, NaNoWriMo feels like a perfect opportunity to try and get back on track. I’m not going to be putting too much pressure on myself, but it’s not uncommon for me to churn out 2-4k words in a day depending on what I’m writing about, so getting through the 1670 or so per day required to hit 50k by the end of November feels very doable.The key thing, for me, is going to be writing every single day. That’s the habit I’d like to get back into, and I’m hoping just forcing myself to do it as part of a big communal event will be just what I need to get myself back into gear.